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Tag: activism

Today’s blog post comes from Michael Hussey, education and exhibit specialist at the National Archives.

What do Sean Penn and Ronald Reagan have in common? Probably not a whole lot besides Harvey Milk.

In 2008, Penn played the role of San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk in the Academy Award–winning film Milk.

In 1978, former Governor Ronald Reagan, Supervisor Milk, President Jimmy Carter, and former President Gerald Ford all opposed a ballot initiative sponsored by California state senator John Briggs. The “Briggs Initiative” would have banned gay men and lesbians from being teachers or otherwise employed by California school districts.

Copy of the opening of Harvey Milk's speech that he sent to the White House. From the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library.

Milk, who had been elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977, gave a rousing speech at the city’s 1978 Gay Freedom Day celebration. In it, he challenged Briggs and others to reexamine American history.

On the Statue of Liberty it says, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free . . . .” In the Declaration of Independence it is written “All men are created equal and they are endowed with certain inalienable rights . . . .” That’s what America is. No matter how hard you try, you cannot erase those words from the Declaration

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